Three Albanian brothers convicted in a plot to attack Fort Dix in New Jersey received life prison sentences Tuesday. Dritan Duka, Eljvir Duka and Shain Duka were convicted along with two others in December of conspiring to kill U.S. soldiers at the base.
According to the Newark Star-Ledger, U.S. District Judge Robert Kugler told a packed and heavily guarded Camden courtroom that "Nothing has a greater impact on society than the crime of terrorism."
Dritan Duka, an ethnic Albanian, was arrested in May 2007 while attempting to purchase automatic rifles from an FBI informant. In court on Tuesday, he proclaimed his innocence, asserting that he had nothing to do with a terror plot and that he and his co-defendants were victims of a government conspiracy.
The plot unraveled after a Circuit City employee in Mt. Laurel, N.J, became worried while transferring a video made by the conspirator video onto DVD. Prosecutors said the video showed a group of young men at a January 3, 2006 training session shooting assault weapons at a firing range while shouting, "Allahu Ahkbar."
The employee informed the FBI, which launched a 15-month investigation leading to the indictment of the three Duka brothers and co-defendants Mohammad Schnewer and Serdar Tatar, who will be sentenced Wednesday. More details about the sentencing can be found here.